New Patricia Piccinini app may help you ‘get’ the SkyWhale

I think Piccinini’s work is gorgeous, you may not, but I think we can all agree it’s certainly interesting. Here’s a way to find out more.

A New York company called Art Intelligence has developed an app about Patricia Piccinini to help people understand her work, including the Skywhale.

The company’s founder, art historian and critic Bridget L. Goodbody, says that the app is not only a deep dive into Patricia’s work, but also an introduction to the science and pop culture that inspired it.

“To be honest, it’s the perfect thing for all those people who are puzzled about why Patricia did what she did with the Skywhale,” Dr Goodbody said.

“The app also situates her work within a timeline of genetic engineering, from the Dolly the Sheepto now. These sources she draws from are crucial for people to understand better, since the health of our bodies and our planet depends on us all being informed.”

The app, for iPad, is called Patricia Piccinini: Mother Love (The New Naturalism) and costs $US5.99 from the App Store. It is described as featuring ‘the internationally renowned Australian artist Patricia Piccinini whose sculpted human/animal hybrids, moon-eyed mutations, and transgenic creations are tender visions of art imitating life imitating science that already exists.’

For the benefit of prior posts and their posters, Patricia Piccinini is the *subject* of an app, not the creator, licensor, or copyright holder of this endeavour by a completely unrelated business entity on the other side of the planet.

So, $300,000 for two brief rides over the city, and now the citizenry of canberra will be required to fork out a total of twice or even three times that for those over, say, 14 to all access information about it. Why didn’t the idiot C100 team think to create a free app? And how much will the artist stand to benefit in royalties, please, having already supped at the trough of irresponsible ACT largesse?

I feel no need to “understand” the Skywhale. It is what it is and my interpretation is mine and mine alone. Which to me is what is art is really about. I don’t need any artist or anyone else try force their meaning of some artwork onto me. That reeks of serious insecurity issues!